Michael S. Foster, Shirley Gorenstein, eds. Greater Mesoamerica: The Archaeology of West
and Northwest Mexico. Salt Lake City: Utah State University Press, 2000. xvi + 307 pp.
$65.00 (cloth), ISBN 978-0-87480-655-7.
Reviewed by Charles C. Kolb (National Endowment for the Humanities)
Published on H-LatAm (August, 2001)
Greater Mesoamerica: Between the Mexican Central Plateau and the American Southwest
1974; London: Thames and Hudson, 1974), and a companion archaeological synthesis entitled North America
(New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1975). There is no doubt
as to the editors’ skills and excellent credentials.
Greater Mesoamerica: Between the Mexican Central
Plateau and the American Southwest
[Disclaimer: The opinions expressed herein are those
of the reviewer and not of his employer or any other federal agency.]
The editors and contributors assert and document
with their collective field research and the syntheses provided in this volume that the term “Greater Mesoamerica” expands the traditional definition of what is normally perceived to be the culture area of “Mesoamerica.” In the initial chapter, the editors discuss the background of this culture area, the early exclusion of West
and Northwest Mexico, chronological systems, and geographic and ecological factors. It is worth reviewing some of their introductory remarks. In 1943 Paul
Kirchhoff in his classic article “Mesoamerica: Sus limites geograficas, composition etnica y caracteres culturales” (Acta Americana 1:92-107) defined the area, refining
a paradigm devised by William H. Holmes in 1914. Using
cultural traits plotted geographically, the regions of west
and northwest Mexico on the northern Mesoamerican
periphery were excluded from Mesoamerica and were
also separate from another culture area, the American
Southwest. For the first 60 years of the 20th century, a
handful of individuals conducted research in these two
regions–Alfred V. Kidder, Isabel Kelly, Carl Sauer, Donald Brand, Gordon Ekholm, J. Charles Kelley, Betty Bell,
Clement Meighan, Charles Di Peso, Eduardo Noguera,
and Carroll Riley, among others.
The editors of this volume and their colleagues are
well known to scholars of Mesoamerican archaeology,
particularly to researchers who work in Central Plateau
(Meseta Central) and environs as well as west and northwest Mexico. Michael Foster is project director for the
cultural resources program at the Gila River Indian Community and resides in Phoenix, Arizona. Foster coedited, with Phil Weigand’s, a volume entitled The Archaeology of West and Northwest Mesoamerica (Boulder,
CO: Westview Press, 1985). Shirley Gorenstein is professor emerita of anthropology, Rensselaer Polytechnical
Institute. She is the author of a brief general textbook, Introduction to Archaeology (New York: Basic Books, 1965),
and notable monographs on west Mexico. Among the
latter are Tepexi el Viejo: A Postclassic Fortified Site in the
Mixteca-Puebla Region of Mexico (Philadelphia: American
Philosophical Society, 1973), Acambaro: Frontier Settlement on the Tarascan-Aztec Border (Nashville, TN: Vanderbilt University, Publications in Anthropology, 1985)
and Tarascan Civilization: A Late Prehispanic Cultural
System, co-author with Helen Pollard (Nashville, TN:
Vanderbilt University Press, Publications in Anthropology, 1983). She was the supervising editor of the textbook, Prehispanic America (New York: St. Martin’s Press,
Eric Wolf examined the history of the northern
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boundary of Mesoamerica subsequently in his delightful,
thought-provoking Sons of the Shaping Earth (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1959). With revisions (notably by Pedro Armillas in 1964), the Mesoamerican
boundaries have been published on maps in major textbooks written by Gordon R. Willey (1966) and Muriel
Porter Weaver (1972, with more recent editions in 1981
and 1993).[1] Interestingly, Foster and Gorenstein do not
mention Section X on Mexico in Alfred L. Kroeber’s ecologically oriented Cultural and Natural Areas of Native
North America (Berkeley: University of California, Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology, Vol.
38, 1939), which also considers boundaries.
ogy symposium is another notable contribution.
The chapters that comprise Foster and Gorenstein’s
volume are revised from papers originally presented at
the first roundtable meeting of the Center for Indigenous Studies in the Americas (CISA) which was entitled
“Cultural Dynamics of Precolumbian West and Northwest Mexico,” held over three-day period in Phoenix in
February 1992. The Wenner-Gren Foundation provided
conference support for Anthropological Research and the
CISA, a non-profit branch of Soil Systems, Inc., a cultural
resource management firm. The discussants for the papers were Jeffrey Dean and E. Charles Adams. Collectively the published volume has a Forward, Preface and
A volume entitled El occidente de Mexico (Mexico: So- 15 numbered chapters. A total of 135 figures, 52 endnotes
ciedad Mexicana de Antropologia, 1947), was an initial (from only four chapters), three tables, and a seven-page
attempt to collect information on the western regions. conflated double-column index of proper nouns and topBut with the publication of the Handbook of Middle Amer- ical terms emend the essays. A particular strength of the
ican Indians (HMAI) in the 1960s and 1970s, archaeo- book is its compilation of 971 references (pp. 263-296),
logical research in Mesoamerica expanded dramatically essential for any future scholarship. I shall summarize
thereafter, particularly in the Meseta Central, the Maya briefly the individual chapters and provide some comHighlands, the Valley of Oaxaca, and the Gulf Coast. ments prior to an overall assessment of the book.
Individual chapters in the Handbook authored by Bell,
As noted, in “Chapter One: West and Northwest MexChadwick, Kelley, Lister, and Meighan, and published
ico:
The Ins and Outs of Mesoamerica” (pp. 3-19, 5 figin 1971 covering Nayarit, Jalisco, Colima, Guerrero, Miures)
editors Gorenstein and Foster consider the percepchoacan, Sinaloa, Zacatecas, and Durango provided a
tions of Mesoamerica as a culture area with emphasis
baseline for research north and west of the Mesoameron the northern and western frontiers, but they also asican culture area frontier.[2] However, there has been a
virtual explosion of interest, field research, and publica- sess the chronological systems used by various authors
tion on the archaeological cultures and regions of west and provide succinct summaries of the subsequent chapand northwest Mexico during the past three decades, par- ters. This essay is compelling and essential to the reader’s
comprehension of the chapters that follow since it places
ticularly during the past dozen years.
the issue of frontiers in content, and shows how the indiThe book’s dust jacket blurb asserts that this volume vidual contributions relate to the greater whole. Maps of
constitutes “the first comprehensive overview of both re- the archaeological sites, natural ecological regions, cligions [west and northwest Mexico] since the Handbook mate, and mean annual precipitation derive from chapof Middle American Indians was published in the early ters in the initial volume of the Handbook of Middle Amer1970s.” This isn’t quite true. Betty Bell’s edited synthe- ican Indians (1964) are adequate, although this reader
sis, The Archaeology of West Mexico (Ajijic, Jalisco: So- believes that more up-to-date sources might have been
ciedad de Estudios Advanzados del Occidente de Mex- used. Although each chapter is characterized, there is no
ico, 1974) and the Michael Foster and Phil Weigand overall editorial summary or assessment. Mike Spence
edited volume The Archaeology of West and Northwest does provide something of that in the penultimate chapMesoamerica (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1985) were ter.
among earlier serious attempts at synthesizing these re“Chapter Two: The Late Terminal Preclassic in Southgions. A Spanish-language scholarly treatment edited
eastern
Guanajuato: Heartland or Periphery? ” (pp. 21by B. Bohem de Lameiras and Weigand, entitled Origin
33, 9 figures) by Charles A. Florance (Clifton Park, NY) is
y desarrollo de la civilizacion en el occidente de Mexico
an evaluation of 43 archaeological sites from the Puroa(Zamora: El Colegio de Michoacan, 1992), is a significant
resource. Likewise, Jonathan Reyman’s edited The Gran guita area and a refinement of the chronology based
Chichimeca: Essays on the Archaeology and Ethnohistory on his study of 7,000+ potsherds dating to the Early
of Northern Mesoamerica (Aldershot, UK: Avebury, 1995), Chupicuaro, Chupicuaro, and Mixtlan phases. His condeveloped from a 1985 Society for American Archaeol- clusion is that there was a population movement from
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the west of Mexico along the Rio Lerma during the Early
Chupicuaro phase. The new settlements being established, he contends, are peripheral to those located in
the Jalisco highland lake area during Early Chupicuaro.
However, in the subsequent Chupicuaro phase evidence
of inter-regional exchange with sites in the Basin of Mexico is evidenced and he postulates that Cuicuilco, a major settlement in the southern Basin of Mexico, promoted
this activity. The evaluation is based on the study of ceramics and figurines. However, the eruption of the volcano Xitle terminated Cuilcuilco’s hegemony in the Basin
and interrupted the economic connections with Guanajuato. Clearly the interpretation of the Chupicuaro site
is a key to understanding the Basin of Mexico-Guanjuato
connection. Florance presents new arguments about local developments and interrelationships that do not rely
on the Cuicuilco model, hence, southeastern Guanajuato
may be seen as a periphery or as a heartland as spatial
and temporal scales change.
Evolution and Decline of a Core of Civilization: The Teuchitlan Tradition and the Archaeology of Jalisco“ (pp. 4358, 7 figures). His evaluation of the highland lake districts of western Jalisco emends and expands greatly his
earlier research in this area, and he devises a chronology
that begins with the Paleoindian period and extends into
the Postclassic. Weigand considers differential sociocultural development and core-periphery relationships in
the 1,000-year Teuchitlan tradition leading to a probable state-level society. Among the characteristics are the
concept of circularity in architecture, societal intensification, intense pressures on land and natural resources,
the construction of terraces and chinampas to maximize
maize cultivation, and the erection of fortifications in the
core area. He provides evidence that Teuchtitlan was an
urban state-level society not unlike those of the Lowland Maya (rather than like the polities in the Basin of
Mexico), but it began a sociopolitical decline in the late
Classic period. Weigand considers the Classic period collapse and societal reorganization during the Postclassic,
With “Chapter Three: A Summary of the Archaeol- and offers three scenarios for the decline of the Teuchitogy of North-Central Mesoamerica: Guanajuato, Quere- lan tradition. The evidence for the Postclassic period is
taro, and San Luis Potosi” (pp. 35-42, 7 figures) by not entirely secure for the region but he had presented a
Beatriz Braniff C. (Institute Nacional de Antropologia e compelling assessment updating his own prior interpreHistoria, Centro Colima), the reader is exposed to an
tations.
evaluation of the area north of the Rio Lerma, particularly to localities–Bajio and Tunal Grande. Her analy“Chapter Five: Tarascans and Their Ancestors: Presis raises questions about the current beliefs about rela- history of Michoacan” (pp. 59-70, 7 figures, 1 table) by
tionships between the Chupicuaro phase and subsequent Helen Perlstein Pollard (Michigan State University) is the
Mixtlan phase chronology. By employing finite local first of two chapters by Pollard. She begins with an aschronologies based upon ceramic analysis, she provides sessment of the evidence of human occupation from the
clearer evidence of the relationships of archaeological Paleoindian and Archaic periods (both not well reprephases across a number of regions in Guanajuato, Zacate- sented in Michoacan) through the Preclassic with shaft
cas, Michoacan, Quetetaro, and highland Jalisco. This tomb construction and maize domestication BCE 1500,
“north-central” regional tradition is widely distributed and the development of Chupicuaro culture in the Rio
by BCE/CE and by CE 250 the Bajio region has a well- Lerma Valley. Rapid demographic expansion and, the
defined settlement pattern with cities, town, and satel- emergence of elite classes, the construction of ceremolite settlements. Notably, there are cultural contacts with nial centers, and cultural contacts with Teotihuacan in
Teotihuacan, a dominant polity located in the northeast- the Basin of Mexico are distinctive traits of the Classic peern Basin of Mexico, and with the Teuchitlan tradition riod. In the Postclassic, demographic nucleation in defenof highland Jalisco. A Toltec cultural tradition deriving sible locations in several lake basins accompanies a trend
from the region of Tula, Estado de Hidago is evidenced toward the formation of regional cultures, and a radical
between CE 600 to 850, overlapping the period of the diminution of contact with the Basin of Mexico. Poldemise of Teotihuacan hegemony and the influx of Toltec lard next considers the development of Tarascan culture
culture into that region from the northwest. Changes in in the late Postclassic and the emergence of the Tarasthe horticultural subsistence patterns ca. CE 900 are re- can state in the Patzcuaro Basin, which expanded during
flected in settlement, demographic, and societal manifes- the Protohistoric period into all of Michoacan and into
tations, although a Toltec revival is discerned ca. CE 1000 Jalisco and Guerrero. Well known are Tarascan disputes
to 1200.
with the Aztecs along the eastern frontier of the Tarascan
polity. In “Chapter Six: Tarascan External Relationships”
Phil C. Weigand (Colegio de Michoacan and Museum
(pp. 71-80, 3 figures, 2 tables) Pollard expands our unof Northern Arizona) is the author of Chapter Four: The
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derstanding of the Tarascan-Aztec territorial conflict by
examining social, economic, political, and military factors. The use of state merchants, control of obsidian resources, absorbing small states, and success in locating
important raw materials are assessed. Pollard elaborates
the distinctiveness of Tarascan culture versus the Aztec
and also summarizes the 17 Tarascan-Aztec military engagements from CE 1430 to 1521 in west Mexico. These
chapters update materials from her own book Tariacuri’s
Legacy: The Prehispanic Tarascan State (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1993).
that the origin and development of metalworking in this
region is associated with the Aztatlan tradition, and the
production and distribution of shell jewelry, pottery, and
obsidian (especially at the Amapa site). Aztatlan ceramics with iconographic motifs were distributed northward into the Mexican states of Durango and Chihuahua,
and into New Mexico, while Toltec plumbate ceramics
and Mazapan-style figurines entered Aztatlan from central Mexico. Subsequent local cultural developments,
demographic expansion, and sociopolitical fragmentation into small chiefdoms characterize the region prior
to Spanish contact. This contribution updates MounMissing from the citations is Pollard’s own “Recent
tjoy’s “Some Important Resources for Prehispanic CulResearch in West Mexican Archaeology” Journal of Artures on the Coast of West Mexico” (pp. 61-87) in The
chaeological Research 5:345-384, 1997) which has 14- Gran Chichimeca: Essays on the Archaeology and Ethpages of bibliography including items on the Tarascans nohistory of Northern Mesoamerica, edited by Jonathan
not cited in this chapter. Christopher T. Fisher, Helen Reyman (Avebury, UK: Aldershot, 1995), which has adP. Pollard, and Charles Frederick are the authors of “In- ditional salient information on resources including salt,
tensive Agriculture and Socio-political Development in
marine shell, cotton, and exotic stones.
the Lake Patzcuaro Basin, Michoacan, Mexico” Antiquity
73(271): 642-649 (September 1999), cited as a conference
“Chapter Eight: The Prehistory of Mexico’s Northpaper in Foster and Gorenstein’s Bibliography (p. 272) west Coast: A View from the Marismas Nacionales of
but since published. Readers may wish to know that Tri- Sinaloa and Nayarit” (pp. 107-135, 22 figures) is written
cia Gabany-Guerrero and Christine Hernandez are orga- by Stuart D. Scott (professor emeritus, State University of
nizing a symposium entitled “Revising Tarascan Studies: New York at Buffalo) and Michael S. Foster (Phoenix, AZ).
Archaeological and Ethnohistorical Challenges for Late The coastal plain Marismas is a vast system of estuaries
Post Classic and Early Colonial Research” for the 100th and lagoons that has been studied by Scott and his assoAnnual Meeting of the American Anthropological Asso- ciates over a ten-year field project. Tectonic and ecologciation in Washington DC, to be held 14-18 November ical factors affected the nature and extent of prehistoric
2001.
occupation of the area. Understanding these factors is
essential to interpreting the prehistory of this complex
Joseph B. Mountjoy (University of North Carolina at area and the adaptive strategies used by the inhabitants.
Greensboro) wrote “Chapter Seven: Prehispanic Cultural
A unique shell mound, El Calon, a probable Formative
Development along the Southern Coast of West Mex(e.g. Preclassic) ceremonial center dated to about 3,700
ico” (pp. 81-106, 14 figures), an assessment of a unique years ago, which has a temple-like structure fashioned
ecological region whose inhabitants exploited maritime from the articulated shells of a large ribbed clam. There
resources, developed slash-and-burn maize horticulture, are two major ceramic period phases that define the peand had access to valuable mineral resources. The Pre- riod CE 400 to Spanish contact, but with a hiatus CE 900
classic Capacha tradition is related to El Openo in Mito 1200. Most of the decorated pottery found at 500 shell
choacan, San Blas culture in Nayrit, and Tlatilco in the
middens associated with villages and hamlets is affiliated
southern Basin of Mexico–the latter seen in ceramics with cultures from Amapa, Nayarit and Chametla, Culiand figurines. Subsequent to CE 300, Mountjoy dis- acan. There are detailed illustrations and explanations of
cerns the Shaft Tomb and Tuxcacuesco traditions, which Chametla, Aztatlan, and Early and Late Culiacan polyhe considers in terms of site distributions, sociopolitical chrome ceramics. The authors also consider interactions
features, economy, and external relations, including the
between the West Coast cultures and Chalchihuites, Duexchange of coastal marine shell for highland obsidian
rango and what is termed the Aztatlan Mercantile Sys(volcanic glass, an essential cutting tool). He also de- tem.
fines a Red-on-Buff ceramic tradition and the late ClasIn Chapter Nine the late J. Charles Kelley writes exsic/Postclassic Aztatlan tradition with civic-ceremonial
centers located in every large river valley in Jalisco and tensively about a long distance trading model, “The Azsouthern Sinaloa, and in the highlands along major com- tatlan Mercantile System: Mobile Traders and the Northmercial routes leading to central Mexico. He also notes westward Expansion of Mesoamerican Civilization” (pp.
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137-154, 4 figures, 11 endnotes). Using a mobile trader
paradigm from ethnohistoric sources and new data from
his excavations at the Schroeder site in Durango and
from Canon del Molino, Durango, Kelley assesses the
evidence for a distribution network for Aztatlan materials (turquoise, marine shell, cotton, etc.) in west and
northwest Mexico, and links to central Mexico and the
Mixteca-Puebla region. He presents evidence for the system operating from CE 900/950 to 1350/1400, and associates the development of the Paquime site (the more
appropriate name for Casas Grandes which has Mogollon cultural roots) as a Mesoamerican “gateway” and
part of a central place system or socioeconomic interaction sphere that brought Mesoamerican characteristics
into the American Southwest and west Texas, but collapsed with Tarascan state expansion ca. CE 1450 to 1500.
The distinction between the early (CE 950-1300) and late
(1250-1400) systems is notable.
sites (CE 650 to 800), and the mechanisms for the spread
of cultural traits during the Epi-Classic period. Darling is
opposed to a thesis Turner and Turner postulated in Man
Corn: Cannibalism and Violence in the American Southwest (1999) that involves Mexican Toltec incursions into
the Southwest. [3]
“Chapter Eleven: The Archaeoastronomical System
in the Rio Colorado Chalchihuites Polity, Zacatecas: An
Interpretation of the Chapin I Pecked Cross-Circle” (pp.
181-195, 12 figures, 11 endnotes) is by J. Charles and Ellen
Abbott Kelley (Sul Ross State University). This essay offers a provocative interpretation of archaeoastronomical features at the sites of Alta Vista and Cerro Chapin,
and emphasizes a pecked cross-circle at the latter ceremonial site that is nearly situated on the Tropic of Cancer. Similar cross-circles are found at Teotihuacan in the
Basin of Mexico, and the Kelleys argue that Teotihuacan
established Alta Vista. The “Labyrinth,” a structure at
Alta Vista, is also reported and associated with equinox
sunrises and the peak of Picacho Pelon in the Cerro de
Chalchihuites. They also determined that other peaks
and cross-circles at Alta Vista marked the summer and
winter solstice sunrises. In addition, the Cerro Chapin I
petroglyph is seen as related to the summer solstice. Each
circle-cross is perceived to be unique and the authors invite a rigorous assessment of their paradigm. Anthony
Aveni and John Carlson, leading scholars of archaeoastronomy, read or commented on the manuscript.
With “Chapter Ten: Archaeology of Southern Zacatecas: The Malpaso, Juchipila, and Valparaiso-Bolanos Valleys” (pp. 155-180, 22 figures, 18 endnotes) by Peter F.
Jimenez Betts (Instituto Nacional de Antropologia e Historia, Centro Zacatecas) and J. Andrew Darling (MexicoNorth Research Network, Chihuahua, Mexico), the focus
of the essays changes to Zacatecas and the La Quemada
and Chalchihuites areas. They summarize past research,
and argue that the La Quemada and Chalchihuites cultures were initially similar but that these cultural traditions diverged significantly through time. Some recent thinking has homogenized these cultures into a singular pan-Chalchihuites cultural tradition that encompasses the La Quemada (Malpaso Valley), Chalchihuites,
and Juchipila cultures of the region. Jemenez and Darling argue strenuously against this paradigm contending that this view ignores local archaeological sequences.
The authors next discuss recent research in three valleys,
emphasizing ceramics-derived chronologies: 1) Malpaso
Valley dominated by the extensive site of La Quemada
(ball court, columnar hall, plaza complexes, road systems,
and domination of lesser communities); 2) Juchipila Valley sites linking southern Zacatecas and west Mexico;
and 3) Valparaiso Valley (the La Florida site and Bolanos
culture, and the site of Tonoate). Their assessment resolves problems in earlier research (Hrdlicka versus Kelley), suggests an obsidian procurement system, and refines chronologies. There are 25 raw material obsidian
sources used in the production of prismatic blades for distribution throughout Zacatecas and adjacent areas. The
authors pose new questions about the development of the
large sites, nearly simultaneous florescence for all major
Michael Foster’s “Chapter Twelve: The Archaeology
of Durango” (pp. 197-210, 13 figures) commences with a
review of previous research, including early Spanish explorer accounts, and the beginning of systematic research
by J. Charles Kelley in the 1950s. Foster begins with the
Paleoindian and Archaic evidence (both meager), and the
development and spread of the Loma San Gabriel horticultural and pottery-making tradition from the Archaic
Los Caracoles complex. The Loma San Gabriel is determined to be a non-Mesoamerican culture located in western Zacatecas and eastern Durango, 300 BCE to CE 1450.
Settlement pattern and ceramic data are employed in the
lack of systematic stratigraphic excavations, and much
of what is reported about Chalchihuites culture is based
on excavations at the Schroeder site. He considers that
Loma may have given rise to the Canutillo phase in western Zacatecas but that expanding Chalchihuites culture
in Durango displaced Loma. Aztatlan cultures penetrate
the Durango highlands ca. CE 600 and the region is incorporated into the Aztatlan Mercantile System, so that
west Mexican characteristics dominate from CE 950 to
1400. Foster’s discussion of sites, burials, and pottery for
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the Preclassic phase through the prehistoric to historic
transition is essential to comprehending Durango’s long
and complex culture history.
The final essay, “Chapter Fifteen: From Tzintzuntzan
to Paquime: Peers or Peripheries in Greater Mesoamerica? ” by Michael W. Spence (University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada) a central Mexican speIn “Chapter Thirteen: Recent Advances in Chi- cialist who also knows the archaeology of north and west
huahuan Archaeology” (pp. 221-239, 4 figures), Ronna Mexico, summarizes some of the authors’ significant
Jane Bradley (University of New Mexico at Valencia) bepoints and arguments. Spence considers the role of Teotigins with a review of past archaeological investigations
huacan in obsidian control, marine shell exchange, the
and initial interpretations of Chihuahuan prehistory. The distribution of talud and tablero architectural traits, the
modern era of research begins with Charles C. Di Peso’s probable Michoacano enclave at the Teotihuacan urban
Joint Casas Grandes Expedition at Paquime and in four center, and the nature of the Aztatlan complex. He evalother sites that led to the postulate of a six phase Casas uates the narrowness of the definition of Mesoamerica,
Grandes chronology phase from Preceramic through Esand offers important suggestions for future research, bepanoles. Di Peso argued for a merchant-trader (pochteca)
ginning with extensive regional surveys, selected stratimodel with Paquime as a trading outpost and craft pro- graphic excavations, and technical analyses of artifacts.
duction center. Bradley uses new dendrochronological
(tree ring chronology) data to refine the culture periods
This volume is a significant contribution to our unand she reevaluates Chihuahuan social complexity, craft derstanding of west and northwest Mexico and the relaproduction systems, and water control systems. She con- tionships with central Mexico, particularly the Basin of
cludes by discussing Paquime’s role in the Aztatlan Mer- Mexico and environs where Preclassic Cuicuilco, Classic
cantile System as well as other paradigms: prestige goods period Teotihuacan, and the Postclassic Toltec and Aztec
exchange, the Mesoamerican world system, and peer- (Mexica) cultures flourished. Foster and Gorenstein have
polity model.. Readers will find a different evaluation of assembled a group of compelling essays derived from
Di Peso’s paradigms in Culture and Contact: Charles C. the 1992 conference, admirably edited the revised and
Di Peso’s Gran Chichimeca edited by Anne I. Woosley and emended contributions, and presented the reader with a
John C. Ravensloot (Dragoon, AZ: Amerind Foundation current and salient synthesis of extremely complex areas
Publication, and Albuquerque: University of New Mex- at the so-called Mesoamerican western and northwestico Press, 1993). Separate contributions by Carroll Riley, ern frontier. The authors make persuasive arguments for
Randall McGuire, Ben Nelson, Phil Weigand, and Linda the inclusion of parts of west and northwest Mexico in
Cordell are especially illuminating.
the “Greater Mesoamerican” culture area. While much
of the discussion focuses on connections with cultures
With “Chapter Fourteen: The Archaeological Tradi- in the Basin of Mexico, the interrelationships between
tions of Sinaloa” (pp. 241-253, 6 figures, 12 endnotes),
northwest Mexico and the American Southwest are not
Maria Elisa Villalpando (Instituto Nacional de Antropoloadequately discussed.
gia e Historia, Centro Sonora) examines the cultural history of the Estado de Sonora, which is based heavily upon
The peoples of the Central Plateau, west and northceramic data. The lowlands had three cultural traditions: west Mexico, the Valley of Oaxaca, highland Guatemala,
1) Trincheras (CE 750-1450, concentrated in three river the lowlands of the Yucatan Peninsula, and the Mexican
valleys but extending north to the Gulf of California; 2) Gulf Coast had more culture contact than we have been
Huatabampo (which disappears ca, CE 1000, and is asso- able to discern archaeologically. Therefore, this book ilciated with a distinctive red pottery in sites long extinct luminates the fact that Mexican peoples since the Prelagoons, estuaries, and river valleys); and 3) and Cen- classic period have been migrating, communicating, and
tral Coast (viewed as the prehistoric manifestation of the conducting commerce for a very long time. The volethnographic Seri). In the uplands, the Casas Grandes ume is comparable in importance to Stark and Arnold’s
tradition is discerned, centered at Paquime, and the Rio Olmec to Aztec: Settlement Patterns in the Ancient Gulf
Sonora culture in the area between the international bor- Lowlands (1997) [4], and is another example of a regional
der and northern Sinaloa, ending ca. CE 1300. The author assessment that is the result of a conference that enemphasizes the sociocultural and economic differences gages current scholarship and a fine editorial hand. Fosbetween the lowland and upland cultural traditions, the ter and Gorenstein and their colleagues have provided
effect of drought and desertification by mid CE 1400s, and compelling essays with descriptions, interpretations, and
subsequent establishment of the Spanish mission system. paradigms of trade and center-periphery. There is a great
deal yet to learn about west and northwest Mexico, but
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these contributions provide a significant baseline for further research in these areas of “Greater Mesoamerica.”
Charles Kelley, “Archaeology of the Northern Frontier:
Zacatecas and Durango,” in Handbook of Middle American Indians, Vol. 11, Archaeology of Northern Mesoamerica
Part 2, edited by Gordon F. Ekholm and Ignacio Bernal,
general editor Robert Wauchope, pp. 768-801 (Austin:
University of Texas Press, 1971). Robert H. Lister, “Archaeological Synthesis of Guerrero,” in Handbook of Middle American Indians, Vol. 11, Archaeology of Northern
Mesoamerica Part 2, edited by Gordon F. Ekholm and Ignacio Bernal, general editor Robert Wauchope, pp. 619631 (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1971). Clement
W. Meighan, “Archeology of Sinaloa,” in Handbook of
Middle American Indians, Vol. 11, Archaeology of Northern Mesoamerica Part 2, edited by Gordon F. Ekholm and
Ignacio Bernal, general editor Robert Wauchope, pp. 754763 (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1971).
A few minor errors appear in the citations, for example: Federick = Frederick (p. 272) and Glaascock = Glascock (p. 274). The reference to Bell 1971 in Handbook of
Middle American Indians should be to Vol. 11 rather than
Vol. 10 (p. 265).
Notes
[1]. Gordon R. Willey, Introduction to American Archaeology, Vol. 1: North and Middle America (Englewood
Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1966) and Muriel Porter Weaver,
The Aztecs, Maya and Their Predecessors: Archaeology of
Mesoamerica (New York: Academic Press, 1993).
[2]. Betty B. Bell, “Archaeology of Nayarit, Jalisco,
and Colima,” in Handbook of Middle American Indians,
Vol. 11, Archaeology of Northern Mesoamerica Part 2,
edited by Gordon F. Ekholm and Ignacio Bernal, general
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If there is additional discussion of this review, you may access it through the network, at:
https://networks.h-net.org/h-latam
Citation: Charles C. Kolb. Review of Foster, Michael S.; Gorenstein, Shirley, eds., Greater Mesoamerica: The Archaeology of West and Northwest Mexico. H-LatAm, H-Net Reviews. August, 2001.
URL: http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=5403
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